Wednesday, December 15, 2010

First black deputy in Polish parliament

Poland has its first black politician in parliament. John Godson, 40, is originally from Nigeria but moved to Poland in the early 90’s. He lives in the town of Lodz, is married to a local woman and served for several years in the city council. He is a university lecturer teaching at several universities and institutions in Poland and the president of the African Institute in Poland.

John Godson is a member of the leading Civic Platform party of which prime minister Donald Tusk is also a member. He took up a seat in the Polish lower house of parliament following the resignation of a party colleague.

Next parliament elections are due next yeat (2011). Godson is a very popular politician in his hometown Lodz, but it will be a different to keep his seat in parliament after the 2011 elections.

Poland is an ethnically very homogenous country with very few minorities. According to the 2002 census only a couple of thousand people of non-European origin live in Poland.

The country is also notorious for experiencing racist violence although racist crimes have dropped significantly since the early 90’s. Still it sometimes occurs, often combined with hooliganism after football matches.

John Godson will become one of just a handful of black politicians in central Europe

Below I post a little Youtube video about John Godson's private life. You can meet his wife and kids and he tells about his personal issues. It is in Polish only though, and although Youtube features many video's with John Godson, they are all in Polish only. If you understand what is told in this video, feel free to tell us in a comment.

6 comments:

Okay "The Rebel American" signs on once again...I personally think this guy is a badass...Seriously in a country like this a very homogenous country like Poland when you can rise above the color barrier because you actually realize there is no box "Fuck thinking outside" you really educate people and help them realize color really has no relevance....More guys should follow his lead...

Isn't this something, that a Black immigrant in a country as minus-Blacks as Poland can achieve this?! And it's also encouraging that racist violence has dropped considerably since the 1990s. Kudos for Poland!

Another Polish First, and Afro-Polish favorite of mine,is the story of Krystian Legierski, young attorney, gay rights activist and entrepeneur. He is the first Black and/or Gay to be elected to the Warsaw city council in 2010.

Son of a Black Mauretanian father and a White Polish mother, his life reads like a "first in everything" on the Polish progressive actvism scene; especially gay rights.

See his interviews on You Tube (most oin Polish, unfortunately, or Google his name. What surprises me most about him is that, in spite of being the only Black "for miles around", so to speak, he says in interviews that he has experienced very little racism in his life.

WOW! My Mom a retired Chicago Public School teacher (Spanish) was just casually mentioning to me about 40,000 African-Polish people in Poland and I had no idea. So I googled African-Polish and found this article on John Godson! I am real tempted to travel to Poland to learn more of the ancestry of these dynamic and fearless men and women of African descent , to hear their stories of generations before them who immigrated to Poland!! Incredible how the Motherland of Africa through bondage or free will dispersed the beauty of African people on every continent and land on Earth! Loving the diversity and the embrace that Poland seems to have for human beings of African descent!

Diversity is just another word for less white people.Forty thousand African's in Poland? Where did you get that number? I don't see why you're saying they're fearless acting as if Polish people are dangerous and the black immigrants aren't.Poland is 93.7% Polish and lets keep it that way.I already know my people aren't allowed in Africa (South Africa & Zimbabwe) because they're white.So I don't understand why your people are in our countries.

Anonymous, are you going to spam this blog with your comments about South Africa & Zimbabwe? Perhaps you haven't noticed, but this is not a blog about Africa. But since you see every black person as a South African or Zimbabwean I want you to know that you are welcome in South Africa & Zimbabwe. Robert M was my scubba mate in the Dutch Caribbean, so you can take it from me.